World Book Day Campaign to get the Nation sharing stories from Breakfast to Bedtime

I hope everyone had a lovely break and enjoyed the festive season. We had a great time celebrating Christmas in both schools. We enjoyed some wonderful performances and were very proud of all the children who took part. We had a very busy Christmas period with lots going on. Thank you to the kitchen staff who worked so hard in both schools to produce superb Christmas dinners and Christmas party food.

We are now looking forward to all the opportunities the Spring Term will bring. Different trips and visits are already happening and there are several school events to look forward to. All the events for this term are being sent with this newsletter and are available on the websites.

Parent Partnership
We highly value the support of our parents and carers – it makes a huge difference to us and the success that your children have in school. It has been lovely to welcome parents into school for events such as music week and our Christmas performances.

Several parents attended Mrs Holland’s reading workshops and Mrs Mitchell’s phonics workshop. In feedback, they all asked for a similar workshop in maths. These will be at Carterknowle on Thurs 8 February (KS2 addition and subtraction) and Tues 13 February (KS2 multiplication and division) and at Holt House on Wed 14 February (Y1 maths) and Thurs 15 February (Y2 maths). They will all be 9am – 9.45am. You are welcome to attend as many workshops as you would like.

Parents and carers of children in the Butterflies and Honey bees classes are invited to Stay and Play one day in the week 15-19 January. Please sign up for a day on the list up in class.

Top School!
Carterknowle is a top twenty Sheffield primary School! When the results of all the primary schools were published in December, we were all proud and delighted to find that Carterknowle is at number 15 in the top twenty Sheffield primary schools for children achieving the expected standard. Well done to everyone – staff, children and parents for their hard work. What fantastic news!
www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk

Early Years Success
Congratulations to Mrs Mitchell and her team for achieving the Early Years Quality Mark from the Basic Skills Agency. Every key stage in our schools federation now holds a quality mark for the teaching of basic skills.

Online Safety
Safer Internet Day is on Tuesday 6 February. This is an issue of concern to many parents and carers and we take it very seriously in our schools. Swift action is taken to any breaches of our acceptable use policy. If you are unsure about whether a particular site or app is suitable for your child to use then we have been made aware of these sites: www.commonsensemedia.org and www.net-aware.org.uk that you could use to check.

Staff News
Welcome to Mrs Burgess who has joined the midday supervisory team at Holt House and Mrs Macauley who is our new teaching assistant in Y5 at Carterknowle. Congratulations to Mrs Laybourn who had a beautiful baby boy - Freddie - on 2 January. She and baby Freddie are both doing well.